Swamp Musings

Major-league bass bait!



A giant freshwater lobster (crawdad) measuring almost one metre in length has been found in north-west Tasmania.

I'd imagine a old mudbug that big wouldn't make good eatin'.

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It has definitely become springtime down here in the holler. The lemon tree is covered with buds just about to blossom, the figs are leafing out, trumpet vines have covered the forest/clearing interfaces with walls of yellow flowers, and my blue buggy has turned yellow from pollen. Oh, the State Bird is out. Copiously. So is the Skin So Soft.

Been too pretty to continue with the inside tasks and I slap lost interest in one that's due Monday yesterday afternoon. Drug out the weedeater (Rima hates the thing, retired to the balcony down at the shop), Cindy Lopper, and a length of nylon tie-down strapping, gonna finally clear up the mess one of the '04 'canes did to the front greenhouse. Since the greenhouse has lights, worked until I'd attracted the majority of flying insects within a few hundred acres before deciding baked catfish would make a better supper than itty-bitty beetles and moths. Got the roof frame re-squared (I'm still amazed it survived the half-ton of treetop) and 80% shade cloth installed today. LOTS more interior cleanup, otherwise it's ready to play in again.

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I'm pretty sure you caught all the hoopla a couple of mornings ago about NASA gonna release some sort of bulletin on ET life and, as usual, it was a re-hash of info released a while back in a handful of science/space journals. I was really hoping NASA had detected the approach of the Borg.



I want to be assimilated. Oh how I'd like to be assimilated...

Could it be the 'release' was just a blind and THIS is da trufe?



Cosmic 'eel' preys on spiral galaxy

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This was without a doubt the most interesting article I've come across in years:

Sandia’s Z machine exceeds two billion degrees Kelvin

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia’s Z machine has produced plasmas that exceed temperatures of 2 billion degrees Kelvin — hotter than the interiors of stars.

The unexpectedly hot output, if its cause were understood and harnessed, could eventually mean that smaller, less costly nuclear fusion plants would produce the same amount of energy as larger plants. [snip]

A far cry from this earlier article:

Another dramatic climb toward fusion conditions for Sandia Z accelerator

Achieved 1.6 million degrees C
In a different series of experiments, the accelerator achieved a temperature of approximately 1.6 million degrees Celsius (140 electron volts) in a container the size of a spool of thread.

Other experiments in a still smaller volume target suggest temperatures may eventually be achieved on Z in the range of 2.0 to 2.2 million degrees. The now-realistic goal of reaching 2.0 million degrees is so significant because radiation temperatures in the range of two million to three million degrees are generally considered an essential condition for nuclear fusion. [snip]

Too many extra zeros! I rooted through what was released on the web and it's curiouser and curiouser..



A 2.6 MB Z Machine jpeg image is available here.

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Got supper cooking in the kitchen, good old shit on a shingle. Made a roast last week and reserved the drippings. Sauteed some onion and garlic chives in the fat, then added a half dozen sliced Porto Bellas, added the broth and various good herbs, then the diced leftover roast. The fresh homemade bread smells heavenly. SOS is one fine meal!

See ya'll later.